Dear Moderator

Dear Moderator,
I hope you are well. My A2 Coursework is complete, fully uploaded and ready for assessment. I hope you enjoy.
Thank you.
Jake Hawkings

Evaluation: Question 4

Script
During the entire coursework, various technology was used in order to help the whole project come together. Some of the technology I used was extremely helpful, however, there were some bits of it that were not.

During the research and planning stage of my coursework, I relied quite heavily on both the video sharing website Youtube, and also music channels on the television, such as MTV. Both of these were relatively useful in finding music videos to study for conventions, however the TV was not useful in finding music videos specific to my genre of K-Pop. I did find Youtube to be extremely useful, particularly due to the fact that I could pause a video for shots to see which were more conventional. Youtube also had a much larger variety for me to look at so I could find exactly what was useful for me and how I wanted my video to look. (Example)
I also used Facebook quite frequently during the research and planning stage in order to find popular K-Pop bands and find the bands' videos and ones similar to them. Facebook's "Pages You May Also Like" feature came in to play a lot here and allowed me to find a lot of useful examples and videos that I wanted to borrow styles from. (Example)
Microsoft Powerpoint helped me to plan and order my pitch successfully and allowed me to construct my ideas and thoughts how I wanted them to be through the use of the built in HTML linker. (Example) This then allowed me to display all of my Media 2.0 technologies on a more simple format and allowed me to present them neatly during my pitch.

During the construction of my advert and digipack, I used Adobe Photoshop in order to both create and manipulate images. I specifically found the Magnetic Lasso tool to be extremely helpful when cropping images and cutting them away from their backgrounds. From doing that, I was able to create a totally different backdrop for both of my print production pieces that displayed my genre of K-Pop much more effectively, shown here.
The camera I used for my photoshoot was a Nikon D60 DSLR camera. (Show) Primarily, I manually altered the zoom and focus, in order to achieve the shot that I wanted, which I later used in my print production work. When filming, I uses a Panasonic HD camera. (Show) I altered the depth of field to make sure that my actors were the main focal point of my video, and I also used a focus pull in some of my shots.

To evaluate my work, I have again used the social media site Facebook to gain audience feedback and response. I created a specific group on there in order to gather a large amount of feedback in a small amount of time. I also used the video-calling program Skype (Show Skype) to conduct an interview that worked in the same way that a face-to-face one would.
The final piece of technology that I used in my evaluation was the website "Blogger". Blogger has helped me throughout my entire coursework to order my ideas, keep everything saved in one place and even act as a sort of mood board for my pieces.

One piece of technology that I wish I had used, however, is the website "TimeToast". TimeToast allows one to create a timeline of events to help schedule work and work progress. I believe that if I had used this site, I would have managed my time much more effectively than I have done, and thus had more time to perfect my work.

Evaluation: Question 3

To receive feedback from various sources about my work, I decided to conduct a Facebook questionnaire on numerous people, both within my target audience and not within it, I conducted a detailed online interview and also recorded someone watching the video and asked them questions afterwards. I wanted to ensure that I would get a range of feedback from a range of sources and thought that the best way to do that would be to use more than one technique.

My Facebook survey indicated that the music video was interesting and fun to watch, but did definitely have some down sides and had various aspects that needed more work. One common aspect that was mentioned a lot for needing more work was the backdrop and the background, or rather, the lack of. My original idea was to have a completely white or completely black backdrop created with the use of a large sheet. However, I found that this idea was not feasible, especially when trying to fit more than one of my actors in the shot at the same time. Despite this negative feedback, a lot of the other feedback that I gathered was quite positive and suggested that the video was enjoyable and was well edited.

 

Another main aspect of my video that was noticed for needing a bit of extra work was the lip-syncing and miming. The main issue that I found with the lip-syncing was that almost all of the lyrics in my chosen song are in Korean, therefore making the lyrics a lot harder to learn. I tried to overcome this issue by creating a script of the lyrics phonetically, which seemed to be successful on the most part. However, this did not work for the entire video, and therefore the lip-syncing was not as good as it could've been. If I were to try this again, perhaps more practice of the lyrics would help before hand.

I also decided to conduct an online interview via Skype in order to recreate the feeling of a face-to-face interview where one can gather much more in-depth information in regards to a topic. During said interview, I found the same common themes that I found through my Facebook feedback, but I managed to get more explanations as to the thoughts.

I also recorded someone reacting to my video and answering a few questions about it in order to gain further insight into the minds of my audiences and the viewers. Both of these can be found on a playlist below.

Katz and Blumler devised what is known as "The uses and gratifications model" which states that all audiences will use the media to fulfil various "needs", these needs being information, personal identity, social interaction and entertainment. My video aimed to give my audience role models to copy and be like, as is stereotypically done in the genre of K-Pop. I tried to also make sure that a lot of eye contact and direct in address was used in the final cut in order to help my audience construct a personal identity in relation to the role models in the video.
However, I also wanted to make sure that the entertainment needs of my audience was satisfied as I feel that it is a crucial part of a music video, particularly one aimed at such a large audience as K-Pop is. I tried to do this with bright colours, fast paced editing and a continuous reliance on the role models having fun and enjoying themselves.

Evaluation: Question 2

Evaluation: Question 1

During the initial stages of planning, I researched various other K-Pop videos in order to see if there were any running conventions between them and, if so, what they were. I found clear links between groups such as Girls' Generation, f(x) and 2NE1, all of them being well-known, established K-Pop groups. Their videos consist of lots of bright colours and fast cuts, whilst also trying to sell the group as role models for the target audience. The usual target audience for a K-Pop video is that of pre-teen, teen and young adult females, so using the group as role models is part of almost every video.
I over-exposed a lot of the clips and altered some other effects such as the vibrance and contrast in order to make them brighter and more appealing because of the fact that I'd have a relatively young target audience. I attempted to put up and recreate the typical blank backdrop that is used in the more generic and stereotypical videos. This is usually to add even more emphasis to the main stars and portray them as role models even further.

I decided that I wanted to follow most of the conventions of K-Pop girl group videos and thus gathered a lot of inspiration from the larger and more well known acts, particularly the videos shown above. My video had some more unique elements, such as a heavy use of filters, however I primarily wanted my video to be quite redundant. A lot of my video is redundant and relatively unoriginal, however I think the parts that were more entropic were definitely a welcome feature according to my audience feedback, such as my heavy use of filters.

Steve Neale suggested that it was very important for a music video to have both entropic and redundant elements in order to ensure that an audience don't see it as "too repetitive or too different". Too much repetition and redundancy can often lead to an audience becoming bored with the video as it will have nothing new to offer them. On the other hand, too much difference and entropy can lead to an audience becoming confused due to how little they will recognise and they will not know how to respond to the video. It is important to have a decent balance of the two in order to interest the audience with new ideas, but also give them lots of familiar ideas, too.

I actively chose not to include too many dance sequences in my video, however, as I think that my chosen song felt slightly more upmarket and more adult than a lot of the stereotypical K-Pop videos currently on the market. I believe that there is a sort of correlational link between how young an audience is thought to be and the amount of dance sequences that reside in the video, and I didn't aim my video at children.